Man with sexual images of children wins permanent suppression
The identity of a “very wellregarded” Bay of Plenty man sentenced for having 100 objectionable images of children and young people in sexualised poses is to remain a secret.
The man appeared in Rotorua District Court on Thursday and was sentenced to 250 hours’ community work after previously pleading guilty to a charge of possessing objectionable material.
The charge carries a maximum sentence of 10 years’ imprisonment or a $50,000 fine.
The charge related to the man having 100 objectionable images and two objectionable videos.
Through his lawyer, Andy Schulze, the man fought to get a discharge without conviction and continued name suppression.
Schulze said the impact of a conviction was out of proportion with the gravity of offending and argued publication of the man’s name would damage his reputation and impact the man’s wife.
Judge Greg Hollister-jones disagreed the man should have a discharge without conviction. However, he was prepared to grant the man permanent name suppression purely based on the argument publication could have an adverse effect on the man’s wife.
“I am not prepared to gamble on that. You are granted final suppression.”
The man cried in the dock and hugged his wife as he left the courtroom.
The man was charged after police searched his house.
Images later found on the man’s laptop showed children and young people in sexualised poses. The images were assessed and were deemed to promote and support the exploitation of children or young people for sexual purposes, Judge Hollister-jones said.
Schulze argued the images should be considered objectionable at the lower end of the scale and argued they were digital images and therefore could have been digitally created rather than involved actual victims.
However, Judge Hollister-jones disagreed. He said the fact there were 100 images was significant and there was no evidence to suggest the images had been digitally created.
He said the summary of facts specifically said the images “promoted and supported the exploitation of children or young people for sexual purposes”.
He deemed the gravity of the offending to be at the lower end of the moderate range.
Judge Hollister-jones said there were several mitigating factors and when he weighed them all up, it resulted in a 50 per cent discount on the starting point of 12 months’ imprisonment.
These included his early guilty plea, remorse, self referral to a psychologist and his good character.
The judge noted the defendant was “very well regarded” in the community and had letters of support from people who were “very well placed to make character judgments”.
He said the letters described the man’s life-long devotion to his work and how he had made a difference to other people’s lives. He was also described as caring and empathetic.
Judge Hollister Jones said that after considering mitigating factors and applying discounts to the sentence, he was left with a sentence of six months’ imprisonment, which he said could work out to be three months’ home detention or six months’ community detention.
To hand down a sentence of community detention would have required an adjournment and the judge said he wasn’t prepared to do that given the charges had been before the court since January 2020 and the delays – which were out of the man’s hands – had already taken a toll on him and his family.
Therefore, he further reduced the sentence to one of 250 hours’ community work.
He said he had hoped the man could use his skills in a productive manner while carrying out his community work.
“A significant sentence of community work is the appropriate sentence because you have a lot to offer.”